


Moral Of The Story

by Finn4



Category: Daisy Jones & The Six - Taylor Jenkins Reid
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:35:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27121213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Finn4/pseuds/Finn4
Summary: Daisy Jones And The Six was a band on top of the world. The night of their infamous performance on Saturday Night Live proved a major turning point for the band - on and offstage. When long time producer and friend Teddy Price passed away suddenly, it sent the members of the band on paths that were forever altered by the events that followed. This is an account of those events.
Relationships: Billy Dunne/Camila Dunne, Billy Dunne/Daisy Jones
Comments: 3
Kudos: 4





	1. Chapter 1

**Billy:** Teddy Price was like a father to me. A real father. I won’t even say he was like MY father because that would be a major disservice to him. But he was...everything I wanted in a father. Everything I wanted to be as a father. He saw me for who I am. He respected me. He pushed me. He listened to me. As a producer, he made Aurora. That was all him. Convincing me to trust what I knew was right. And not just on the album. He also called me out on my bullshit. Like no one else...not even Camila...could ever do. He saved my life. When he died...

....

Let’s just say it took me a little while to use his death to honor him. And not just add to the list of things he wasn’t around to fix anymore.

**Graham:** Teddy Price died the night we filmed Saturday Night Live in New York City. Billy didn’t know til he showed up in Los Angeles three days later. Three days.

**Karen:** We couldn’t even plan services for Teddy because nobody knew where Billy was.

**Artie** **Snyder:** When I called Billy’s hotel room and Daisy answered? I mean, if it had been any other time I would have been all over that shit. But that morning...I just...they all needed to know. I didn’t care who was fucking who at that point.

**Camila:** Graham called. Asked if I talked to Billy. I said we had spoken after the show but not since. He told me not to call his hotel room. 

...

So of course, I did.

**Daisy:** Artie called. Teddy was gone. Just...gone. And Billy? He was gone, too. When Camila called I was still sitting on the floor by the bed trying to convince myself that everything that had happened...from singing on that stage with Billy to sitting in a pile of sweat trying to process the fact that Teddy was dead...I needed it all to be a dream. It had to be a dream.

**Billy:** Some people chase dreams. Some people chase nightmares. I was trying to figure out which one I was doing.

**Julia/Narrator:** Did you want to talk about what happened that night?

**Daisy:** Teddy Price died. That’s the only thing about that night that mattered then. And it’s the only thing that matters now.

**Camila:** Daisy had spent the night in Billy’s room. After that performance on SNL. Which, if I’m being honest, was more painful for me than anything they might have done that night afterwords. Because maybe they had sex that night. I don’t know. But they fell in love that night. On live television. For the world to see. The rest is details. Details I don’t care to know more about it. 

**Billy:** I left New York. I rented a car. I took off for LA. That’s what happened that night.

**Graham:** I stood in the wings and watched my brother and Daisy Jones basically fuck each other on stage. So no one’s gonna convince me that they spent a night in a hotel room playing cards and watching the news. Sorry, man.

**Karen:** We all saw it that night. If we had been wondering how they felt about each other, there was no wondering after that. I just kept thinking...please Camila. Don’t be watching this. It was breaking my heart for her. Honestly my heart was just breaking for all of them.

**Eddie:** I passed Daisy at the hotel. She didn’t even see me. I was headed back out as she was coming back in. So yeah, I knew she went to his room. And come on. I mean...come on. But I wasn’t there man and it’s not my place to guess. But yeah. 

**Warren:** Lisa Crowne. That’s all I remember about that night. Meeting Lisa Crowne.

**Daisy:** When I got back to LA, I went to Yasmine. Right from the airport. She was sitting by the pool when I found her. I knew she didn’t really have any family there...but seeing her alone, just losing Teddy like she did, made me so incredibly sad. To be alone like that. At a time like that.

________________________

_ Daisy Jones was the first person back to Los Angeles. By the time Rod contacted the band in New York he had already lined up a plane to bring them home. _

_ Billy Dunne wasn’t on it. _

_ And Daisy Jones couldn’t wait for it.  _

_She took a cab to the airport and flew standby in coach to get back as soon as she could. And when she landed, with just a purse full of pill_ s _and underwear, she took a cab to Teddy’s house._

_Daisy didn’t go inside, opting instead to walk behind the house to the pool. The place where they had written Aurora. The place where she first became part of The Six. Her family. A family that was now sorely lacking a patriarch. She had spent the night before begging Billy Dunne to help her get sober and questioning him about rehab...and she had spent the morning on a plane taking Dexies and washing them down with the airplane bottles of booze the stranger next to her was buying. She had to try several times to enter the security code on the pool house gate and finally gave up when she spotted Yasmine sitting on the side of the pool. Her long robe bunched on the concrete, a cigarette hanging lazily in one hand and a martini in the other. Daisy choked back a cry in her throat at the sight of her and walked in her direction instead of into the pool house._

_ She sat next to Yasmine...her bell bottom jeans falling into the water as her sandaled feet dangled there, losing a shoe as she turned toward Teddy Price’s widow. _

_ “How are you holding up?” _

_ Daisy could hardly find the words and she was already willing her self sober just to care for her friend, even if the very last thing in the world she wanted was to feel. Anything.Yasmine lifted her eyes and her drink. She passed it to Daisy who took a long sip as Yasmine took a drag from her cigarette. _

_ “It doesn’t feel real. I keep sitting here. Waiting for him to call me inside. And he won’t. He won’t, will he Daisy?” Yasmine’s voice was distant and haunted. She gradually let the weight of her head fall into Daisy’s shoulder as she spoke. _

_ “No. He won’t. I’m sorry.” _

_ Daisy wasn’t used to being the comforter. She tried to let it settle into her bones. _

_He won’t be calling you, she thought. Not about Teddy. About Billy. He won’t be calling you._

_“He just didn’t wake up. We went to sleep. And he didn’t wake up. I woke up. He didn’t wake up. His body was there. He was gone. Cold. The whole bed was cold. And he was gone. And he’s not coming back. Is he Daisy?”_

_Yasmine was rambling nonsensically but no doubt saying words that had plagued her for days. Finding someone you love like that. It was torture._

_He was gone. The bed was cold. He’s not coming back. Daisy was mourning, she just couldn’t convince her mind of who for._

_“They can’t find Billy. I told them. Billy was like a son to him. We can’t find him. We can’t close this without him. Where is he Daisy?”_

_Yasmine’s words drifted over her and she finished the martini in her hands before thoughtlessly letting the glass sink into the pool. It started to dawn on her that no one knew where Billy was. It wasn’t just her. It wasn’t just Camila._

_No one._

_“I don’t know Billy Dunne.” Daisy spoke under her breath and Yasmine lifted her head._

_“You mean you don’t know where he is?”_

_Daisy pulled her sopping wet legs from the pool and drug herself to standing. She glanced into the pool house. Her eyes took in the piano where they had spent weeks and months and days and nights...working, writing, singing, fighting._

_ “No...” she repeated herself, “I mean I don’t know who he is.” _

________________________

**Camila:** Billy got home that Tuesday night. It was late. Barely night, you could say I guess he got home early Wednesday morning. We had one of those lights that came on when someone opened the gate at the driveway. It came on. I walked to the window and saw him pull in. By the time I pulled a sweatshirt on and walked downstairs...he was still in his car. I watched from the front door for what had to be ten minutes. He didn’t move. So I went to him, barefoot. Scared for him. Scared for us.

**Graham:** Camila and I had been in touch. I talked to her that night. No one had heard from him. Not me, not Rod. We had talked about filing a missing persons report but can you imagine the shit storm that would have been? Teddy’s death was public at that point. Rod released a statement, but God. I think people assumed that Billy found out and lost it. Three days out and he still didn’t even know.

**Karen:** I remember Graham telling me he hoped that he was the one to find Billy. He didn’t want it to fall on Camila to have to tell him.

**Camila:** I had promised Graham I’d call. That no matter when it was..if Billy came home I would call Graham. We would tell him together. But...and this is awful to say now, I suppose...we were all in so much pain. I didn’t care about protecting ting Billy from any more of it. I was...so angry. The grief only made it worse. 

**Eddie:** Yeah we talked about it. We were all pretty sure Billy relapsed. When Daisy left for the airport, Graham and Warren and me went to Billy’s room looking for some fucking idea of where he went. We were equal parts worried and pissed. Nobody more than Graham.

**Warren:** All the booze was gone from the fridge. Every last bottle. And Daisy had been there. I’m not detective but...I’m no asshole either. He was on a bender somewhere...and we were trying to mourn Teddy and fuck, we couldn’t even do that.

**Graham:** I thought...don’t you do this now. Don’t you leave us grieving two people. I thought...God...I hope you’re dead because if you come back strung out or high or with some Billy Dunne sob story...I’ll kill you myself for putting us all through this. 

**Camila:** It was ironic that Billy made us realize just how much we needed Teddy. I wanted to call him to fix this. Instead, I was going to have to tell my husband that he was...gone. Teddy was gone. 


	2. Chapter 2

_Camila walked past the front of Billy’s car, cutting through the beams of his headlights. She paused for a minute to stare at him from there. He barely seemed to register her. His hands were tightly gripping the top of the wheel at ten and two and he stared into the night just over the tops of them. She squinted to watch him, trying to gauge his sobriety. When he didn’t react to her presence she just kept moving...rounding the car until her hand found the handle to the passenger side door. She inhaled sharply, thinking of her promise to Graham, before opening the door and climbing in. Her oversized sweatshirt all but masking her shorts. Her legs and feet bare in the cool night. She slid in next to Billy and pulled the door closed. She stared at the house for a moment: the light still on in their bedroom. The dark windows that stood between them and their three sleeping daughters. She closed her eyes and tried to breathe._

_The car smelled like Billy. Like her husband. Her territory. Musky, woodsy...even if a bit dirty and ripe. But it did not smell the way she assumed it would. There was no smoke...no liquor. No sweet and salty aroma that she could recall in an instant from the days when tequila seemed to just seep from his pores night after night._

_He was sober._

_And now she was more confused than she had been. She opened her eyes to look over at him and his eyes had fallen on the steering wheel, but not turned to her. As he started to speak, he gradually did._

_“I need you to listen to me. And...I want you to just hear me out. I want you to think about how much you love me, and our family, and....” his voice hitched and betrayed his desire to seem assured, “...and our girls. I need you to know that what I’m about to say is not up for discussion, I don’t need you to change my mind. I’m not hoping for a point/counterpoint here. I just...I need you to listen to me. Ok? Please?”_

_He had turned to her and his face was pained but determined. He held out his hand to her and she took it. She nodded yes as her brow furrowed. Billy inhaled and she noticed that same hitch in his breath. He was fighting to seem calm. But she didn’t question it._

_“I’m gonna leave The Six. I don’t know what will happen to the band. I don’t. But I do know what will happen to me. And our family. If I don’t. I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of convincing myself I can be everything to everybody when I can’t. I woke up. The night after that show in New York. I woke up. In the middle of the night and my chest was pounding. I just...I sat up and I thought...I’m gonna die here. They are gonna find me here....” Billy paused and looked at Camila. He held his breath for a long while deciding how to continue, “they are gonna find me here and I’m gonna die right here. Without you. Without my girls. I just. I couldn’t shake it. My chest just...it ached. And I don’t know why I did it, baby, I don’t know but....I knew I had to leave.I left. Left all my shit and got a car and I drove. I drove here. And I want you to know. I’m not doing this anymore. I belong here. With you. With the girls. I have to stop...I have to stop trying to be Teddy for someone else and just start worrying about being the guy Teddy saved. You know? Make him proud. All I’m doing is risking everything. Every day.”_

_Camila felt her cheeks heat and get wet as he spoke. He paused and searched her face. She couldn’t find the words to speak even if she felt like she should._

_“I’m gonna go see him. Teddy. First thing in the morning. And Rod. They deserve to know sooner than later.But I’ve made up my mind. I’m leaving the band._ _It’s the way it’s gonna be now. Ok?”_

_ Camila sat quietly frozen as his question hung in the air leaving her with a million of her own.Why now? What changed? Where had he been for three days? But she was paralyzed. _

_ “Baby...say something....please?” _

_ Billy squeezed her hand in his and she could barely muster the nerve to squeeze back. He leaned towards her as he tears continued to stream the same path on her cheeks. _

_“I’m so sorry. I know I should have called you. I know I fucked up. But I promise.....”_

_“He’s dead.”_

_She interrupted him with words so heavy they tumbled from her mouth like marbles she couldn’t contain anymore and she sat silent under them until a slight sob escaped her lungs. He frowned and shook his head._

_ “What? Who....who’s dead...what are you talking about?” _

_ Billy was fragile and lost. She could see it all over his face and she was about to make it exponentially worse. She raised a shaky hand to his cheek and, trying to make herself smile even as her slow tears came on quicker and quicker, she comforted him preemptively.  _

_ “Billy...baby...Teddy. Teddy is dead.”Her voice shook but managed to form the sentence and she pressed her hand into his cheek as she felt him start to shake his head no under it. _

_ “No....I....I just talked to him...” Billy silently began to protest. _

_ “He passed peacefully in his sleep, Billy. But he’s gone...” _

_“I just talked to him. When....he....when....”_

_“Saturday night. Sometime in the night, Yasmine said he was gone when she woke up.”_

_Billy continued to shake his head until he finally pulled from her and put his hands back on the steering wheel as he looked forward. He was muttering to himself, before he got out of the car silently, barely acknowledging Camila as he left her there and walked towards their home._

__________________

**Camila:** He was asleep in the girls’ room when I got inside. I called Graham. 

**Graham:** I was glad he was alive. Glad he was sober. But nothing about it made sense. ‘Til I talked to him.

**Billy:** So much of that time is a blur. Honestly I barely remember getting to LA. Luckily you can’t mess it up. But three days in a rental car through the mountains and dessert can really mess with a person. I was...not in my right mind.

**Camila:** I don’t know that he had slept. He definitely hadn’t showered. When we all compared notes...he showed up at home in the same clothes he went to the hotel in. 

**Daisy:** Wednesday afternoon Rod called. I was staying in the pool house with Yasmine. He let us know Billy was back. We planned a service. Tabloids were already all over it: everything from Yasmine killing him to Billy being his secret lover. It was a dark couple of days.

**Julia:** Did you see Billy when he was back?

**Daisy:** Not intentionally.

**Billy:** I slept on the floor between the twins. I think most of the next day.I was...in and out of sleep. I felt feverish. I knew I had to see Yasmine but I put it off because it made it real. I didn’t feel real. The strange part was I had felt like that since Saturday night. When I woke up. That empty, sinking feeling. It just got worse and worse and worse. I couldn’t cry about it. I couldn’t even grieve. Even when Graham came.

**Graham:** I didn’t know if it was a mid life crisis or what. I mean he wasn’t old enough for that but it was something. It really was....just something. He was on the couch holding one of the twins...I don’t remember which, maybe Maria. Camila was shook up. I asked her what was going on and she had as little idea as I did. Just said he was off.

**Camila:** It was the only word I could come up with. Off. Distant. Scattered. But it was before I told him. That was what kept shaking me up. That was what I needed Graham to get to the bottom of. Because I wanted to know...but I didn’t want to know.

—————————————

_Graham didn’t have to knock when he got to Billy and Camilla’s. She had been standing at the window and slipped out the door as soon as he pulled into the driveway. She wrapped herself in a cardigan and Graham walked up the steps and hugged her long and hard as she cried softly into his shoulder._

_“You ok?” He asked her gently as she pulled back and wiped her face on her long sleeves. She nodded yes and wiped her nose gently._

_“How is everyone else holding up? Yasmine? I tried to tell Billy he needs to go to her...something is so strange, Graham.”_

_Graham arched a brow and studied her, nodding._

_“I know. I definitely sensed it when I called. Have you....did he say anything about Daisy? Did you talk to Daisy?”_

_He hated to ask but as soon as Camila told him that Billy was sober, and he could rule a three day bender out...Daisy was the only other option he could come up with._

_Camila shook her head no.And Graham had to respect that._

_“I’ll put Karen on that detail. Let’s get inside. I wanna snuggle those girls anyway.” Graham smiled gently and Camila returned it. They walked in the front door and Graham made a triumphant entrance. All three of his nieces charged the door and swarmed him...but his eyes remained on his brother: who sat still on the couch as the girls kept from it and only slowly rose to turn and see his brother moments after. Billy tucked his hands in his pockets and smiled at Camila and then Graham. He walked towards her and kissed her forehead gently before smiling at the girls that had turned Graham Dunne into a jungle gym._

_ Graham slowly let them down, ticking and teasing all the while, until Camila clapped her hands and interrupted. _

_ “Ok you three. Upstairs. We have a lot to do today....” _

_Camila ushered the girls up the staircase, leaving the brothers behind at the door. They stood in silence for a long while before Graham, his hands also pressed neatly into his pockets, cleared his throat and broke the_ _silence_.

_“She told you...about Teddy. You doing ok?” Graham watched Billy’s face: sunken, unshaven, surrounded by unkempt curls that looked like a hangover even if they weren’t. But mostly his eyes...glassy and tired. Sadder than he was prepared for. And Billy didn’t so much as flinch at his question._

_“Hey man. I’m talking to you. Look, I know this hurts. I probably don’t know just how much it hurts you. But it’s hurting all of us. It’s hurting Camila. She loved him, too. You need to snap out of this and come back from wherever the hell you’ve been.”_

_ Graham rarely filled the role of older brother. But when he did? Billy listened. _

_ Billy ran his thumbs over his eyebrows and punched his eyes shut. _

_ “I know.” Was all he could manage. _

_“Ok. Look, I think you and I need to go see Yasmine. She’s been worried sick about_ _you and I know it’ll mean a lot to her. Because of what you meant. To him....”_

_“What time....?”Billy interrupted._

_“I mean I’m ready to go right now, just grab a coat and...”_

_“No I mean what time? What time did he die?” Billy pressed the question out forcefully, surprising Graham._

_“I don’t know man. Sometime after SNL wrapped and Yasmine woke up. I dunno.”_

_“Someone will know....maybe Yasmine...”_

_Billy was throwing a coat on as Graham stood perplexed...studying._

_“Yeah...well...let’s go see her...but maybe let’s not turn it into an interrogation alright? She’s been through a helluva lot.”_

_Billy stopped in place and nodded. Then he headed out the front door to Graham’s car._

____________________

**Graham:** He was there, but he wasn’t.I mean...stages of grief and all that...but it was weird. I hoped maybe seeing Yasmine and talking to her would let him break through some of that. I mean we had all been crying. Even Eddie. I caught him in the alley behind Rod’s place smoking a joint and crying. So I joined him. I’d seen Billy cry a lot in my lifetime. It was weird that he was the one that wouldn’t.

**Billy:** Daisy had taken a cab from LAX, so we didn’t even know she was there until we were inside. No cars in the driveway. I hadn’t seen her since...since I left New York. I couldn’t....I couldn’t tell her why. Why I’d left.

**Graham:** I was right. Seeing Yasmine did him in. Probably because she came unglued when she saw him. She almost fell running towards him and he caught her. She sobbed. Just...wailed. He held her...for awhile...then he broke down too. That kind of crying you almost can’t watch.

**Daisy:** I came inside when I heard Yasmine. I knew she was having a hard time. Then I saw him. Just...weeping with her. And I felt that all too familiar energy: where the sight of him could make me so angry and so hopeful. All at once. And I never knew which one to trust. I sure didn’t that day...but he was hurting. And I didn’t like that. No matter...no matter what else.


	3. Chapter 3

_ Billy held Yasmine and let her cry until neither of them could anymore. She finally pulled from him and, taking his face in her hands, smiled and told him she was glad he was ok. Billy apologized for disappearing and for not being there but she hushed him. Reminding him that they were altogether now and that was what mattered. _

_ “All Teddy would have wanted was his family to be together. And now we are. Now we can say goodbye to him. Together.” _

_ Billy tried to smile and then noticed Daisy over Yasmine’s shoulder. An awareness that was not lost on Yasmine. _

_ “Graham, would you help me inside? I’ve got some boxes of pictures I need a hand with....” _

_ Graham nodded and patted his brother in the back before following Yasmine into the house, leaving Billy and Daisy alone by the pool house. They stood silently for a long while. Billy ran his hands over his face to dry it. Daisy took several long drags from her cigarette, even as her fingers shook around it. She finally finished it and stomped it out on the concrete. She lifted her eyes to Billy and gradually mustered the courage to break the thick silence. _

_ “I’m glad you’re ok.” She whispered and he drowned in her words. _

_ “Ok? I’m not ok. Nothing is ok....” he hissed at her through gritted teeth. She was shook by his response. _

_ “I mean...you’re alive. No one knew where you were. I thought...I...fuck I don’t know what I thought....I’m glad you’re alive. Better?” Daisy was stringing words together...fighting to try to calm him down somehow. _

_ Billy took several steps towards her. She didn’t counter. _

_ “Teddy is dead. Daisy...” _

_ Billy had a million other things to say but as he let himself say the words for the first time felt his heart race and his breath become hard to catch. As he said her name he stopped in place and rocked on his feet as he felt his grief washing over him again. He put his hands over his face and groaned into them as Daisy closed the space between them, putting her hands over his and hushing him. _

_ “I know...Billy....it’s ok....I know....” _

_ For all the times they cursed Teddy for favoring Billy, she knew that it meant this sat deeper in him than they could realize. Billy let her thread her arms under his until she was holding him and he met her by pulling her into him and clutching her against his chest, his fingers bunched in her tank and her hair. He noticed Graham watching him from inside the house. Almost at the same time he noticed how she smelled. He gently eased her from his body and held her trembling arms as he took her in. His face fell and she tried to keep hers from doing the same. _

_ “You’re using...” _

_ The condescending tone in his voice made Daisy pull herself from him. She ran her finger under her nose to catch a tear that hung there. _

_ “Jesus, Billy, not now....” _

_ “Why not now? I think now is the perfect time. You told me you wanted to get clean...” _

_ “Yeah. I did. And you fucking left me alone in that hotel room....” _

_ “Daisy...that isn’t why....” _

_ “Right. Right, I know why you left. You left because you want to be to me what Teddy was to you. And look at us now. You’re not Teddy.” _

_ They stood silent. Both stunned by mutual aggression.  _

_ “Thanks. I needed that reminder today.” _

_ Billy’s voice broke and they both brimmed with regret that would go unspoken. Billy looked at his hands before stuffing them clumsily into his pockets. _

_ “I’m leaving the band.” he whispered to her. Her mind replayed the words over and over. _

_ “You...you can’t leave the band. You ARE the band....you can’t.” _

_ “I am. You can carry them. You can.” _

_ Billy was all business. In that aspect if no other, he was...just like Teddy. _

_ “No I can’t. I don’t want to. You can’t leave. It’s not right. It would kill Teddy.” _

_ “Teddy would have understood. Teddy wanted me to be a good man. That’s what I’m doing.” _

_ “No. What you’re doing is hiding. Pretending. Being afraid. You can’t pretend forever. Don’t do this. Not now. You can’t do this to them....” _

_ “To them or to you?” Billy was fighting himself and she could see it. His jaw clenched as he spoke and it clenched harder as he listened. But she couldn’t answer his question. Not right away. _

_ “All of us. And that includes you. Is this what you decided? On your...vision quest? Or whatever the hell you did when you disappeared?” _

_ “It’s the right thing to do. And yes.” _

_ “Ok. You want me to hate you. You want to be whoever this person I’m talking to right now is. Fine. I saw you. I know who you really are. I know who you see in the mirror. Every day. Before you put this mask on. So you want me to hate you cause it’s easier that way. Don’t you believe for one second that I don’t know that’s exactly what this is. You hide from people who know who you really are...not because you hate me. Because you hate you.” _

_ Daisy stared at him for a moment, watching her words wash over him and deflate him. He had no response. She chuckled to herself and left him alone outside while she went inside for another bump. _

_________________

**Graham:** Yeah I saw them fight. In that way only Billy and Daisy could, you know? Like at any moment they were either going to tear each other’s faces or clothes off. I could fight with Billy, man, always had. But not like that. I mean...you know what I mean.

**Billy:** Daisy wanted to make that moment about her. About the band. Hell, even about me. It wasn’t. It was about Teddy and Yasmine and...fuck...the whole world. It was about making the most of the time we have and I have never regretted the choices I made. And I stand here now sure that if Teddy Price had been alive that day....when I thought I was going to ask his advice and not be told he was gone....if he had been alive...he would have agreed with me. 

**Julia/Narrator:** With the way that it happened? 

**Billy:** (pauses) With the decision I made for my family. 

**Julia/Narrator:** The Six was your family, too. 

**Billy:** (pauses) Yes.

**Daisy:** Billy Dunne is the most stubborn human being I have ever met. If he spent three days talking to ghosts in a rental car about giving up on every dream he ever had? Well...I wasn’t going to change his mind. No one was. End of fucking story.

**Eddie:** God damn the energy was fucked up that week. I mean we were planning Teddy’s funeral. Graham and Karen were weird to say the least, Billy and Daisy were even weirder than usual, I couldn’t get high enough to numb the pain. Yasmine was on so many meds she could barely function. Really Billy and Rod took over planning which left Camila to babysit the rest of us. I’m not complaining. She made so much food that week I gained ten pounds and that’s not even a lie. 

**Karen:** I tried to help Camila but I was feeling all this weight. I felt terrible. Pregnancy was not sitting well with me at all. And the hormones and the emotions and Graham trying to coddle me at every turn. I feel like I was losing my mind. Camila kept telling me to relax, or to sleep, but I couldn’t. I had to do something. For Teddy.

**Camila:** That grief. It was a blessing for Karen. Everyone was too busy to notice things that I noticed right away: the way she slept, ate, how unbelievably moody she was. I lived with Billy Dunne, I could handle moody.

**Julia/Narrator:** Did Billy come back around?

**Camila:** He did. It was the first time I had really seen him mourn. He was mourning Teddy, who might as well have been his dad. But he was mourning more than that. He was convincing himself to let go of the band. The music. His career. He loved it. It was part of who he was. I realized after a few days...he couldn’t do it. I had to change his mind. Those two things together we’re going to break him. And I loved him too much. To let him go like that. 

**Julia/Narrator:** Did you ever feel like encouraging him to stick it out was risky?

**Camila:** Yes. I knew Billy would still be the man I loved if he got clean. But without music? That was part of who he was..not something he used or something he did. It was him. It wouldn’t have been worth keeping him if he was just a shell of himself, would it?

**Billy:** I was going with Yasmine to get everything signed over. Sort of one of those last steps they don’t tell you about you know? Permission to take someone’s body from the hospital, all these little legal pieces. And the worst part of it was the photographers. Everywhere. Teddy’s place. The hospital. I managed to only slug one so that was good. Graham almost decked another one. We kept everything quiet enough that no one got wind of the actual arrangements. Small. Decided to have a big celebration on his behalf some other time. He would have wanted it that way.

**Graham:** I convinced Billy I should go, too, so one of us could take care of business and the other could take care of Yasmine. It was the right call. There was a lot to sign at the funeral home. And Billy was fixated on some weird details. Like needing to know what time Teddy died. Like, exactly what time. Which only made them have to explain how they knew so I took Yasmine for a walk while Billy got a lesson on how blood coagulates and temperature drops in a dead body. It was...too damn much.

**Billy:** I don’t know, I can’t explain it. It was like I felt guilty. I felt guilty for missing him. For not being there. Somehow knowing what happened....

**Julia/Narrator:...was** like self-flatulation. Punishment.

**Billy:** No I think it helped....I mean, I just wanted to know...yeah. Ok maybe it made me feel worse.

**Daisy:** Billy felt guilty then. He never shook that. I’m guessing he still hasn’t but I wouldn’t know, now would I?

**Billy:** Teddy died just after midnight. 3:00am New York time. I talked to him right after we got off the air. Maybe...12:15am. Yasmine said he couldn’t sleep. He was pacing. Something was bothering him. But that he said he was ok. She fell asleep around 1:00am. She found him dead the next morning. 

**Julia/Narrator:** This timeline. He had a heart attack. The coroner’s report read that he died of myocardial infarction. Nothing about this time line could have stopped or even altered that. Why is it important?

**Billy:** It’s important to me.

**Julia/Narrator:** Ok. (pause) You talked to him after the show. That was the last time you spoke. Do you want to share that?

**Billy:** (long pause) He said that it was probably our best performance. He was sad that he hadn’t seen it live. That...he wanted to talk. About the future of the band. What we should do next. How I felt about things. 

**Julia/Narrator:** That was it?

**Billy:** That was it.

______________________

** Phone Call From Teddy Price To Billy Dunne **

** Saturday, February 3, 1979  **

** 12:25est **

_**Teddy:** Just when I think The Six can’t get better. You go and get better. _

_**Billy:** (laughing) Yeah!? _

_**Teddy:** Don’t “yeah” me Billy and do not forget who you are talking to. You know it was brilliant. _

_**Billy:** (still laughing) Ok. _

_**Teddy:** Say it... _

_**Billy:** It was fucking brilliant. _

_**Teddy:** And who made the call to do “A Hope Like You”?  _

_**Billy:** That was my call. _

_**Teddy:** I figured. _

_ (Long silence) _

_**Billy:** You don’t approve? You just said it was brilliant. It was my keys, wasn’t it. I know it was rusty I hadn’t played it in awhile. I should have let Karen take it. _

_**Teddy:** Are you somewhere you can talk? _

_**Billy:** Dressing room, yeah. _

_**Teddy:** Is anyone else there? _

_**Billy:** No. _

_**Teddy:** I respect you too much to pussyfoot around this and I’m going to ask you now instead of waiting til you get home because I want you to be thinking about what happens next. _

_**Billy:** What happens next? You mean a new album? _

_**Teddy:** Do you love Daisy Jones? _

_**Billy:** (pause) Come again? _

_**Teddy:** You heard me. Do you love Daisy Jones? It’s a yes or no question we both know the answer to. _

_**Billy:** (long pause) Then why are you asking? _

_**Teddy:** Because I know you love Camila. And Julia...Maria...Susana. And I know you love this band. This album. Daisy is confusing you because she is both.  _

_ (long silence) _

_**Billy:** (pause) What do I do? _

_ (long silence) _

_**Teddy:** I can’t tell you what to do. That has to come from you. It’s always come from you I just help you listen, that’s all.But if Camila was watching tonight, and something tells me she was, you’re going to have to face this sooner than later. (long pause) Billy you were amazing tonight. The whole world saw it. Ans we both know part of that comes from what the two of you bring to the table. But this life and this career are fleeting. Your marriage is not. You’ve worked hard for both. You can’t work that hard forever. Think on it. We can talk when you return.  _

_**Billy:** Teddy I need more than that. I don’t know what to do. I don’t.  _

_**Teddy:** You do. And I will be as proud of you for whatever you decide as I was watching you tonight. Travel safe. We will figure this out together when you're back. _

_______________________

**Daisy:** I missed a call from Teddy that night. I didn’t know til I stopped at the front desk the next morning to call a cab to LaGuardia. 

.....

1:00am

**Eddie** :Did I talk to Teddy that night? God damn. I wish I could remember. I was pretty baked. I think I might have told Warren I saw Daisy heading to Billy’s room. I think he may have been on the phone with Teddy. I sure wish I would have that’s for sure....that’s for damn sure.


	4. Chapter 4

**Julia/Narrator:** Teddy Price, famed producer and friend of The Six, was buried in a small private ceremony in Malibu, California on February 10, 1979. A week after the band appeared for the first time on Saturday Night Live...arguably one of their best and most legendary performances. It was attended by just a handful of family and close friends, including me. I sat on Billy Dunne’s lap holding the bear that Teddy had bought for me the night I was born: a night when he convinced my father to check in to rehab and took his place at my mother’s side in the hospital with me. Teddy’s casket was attended by the band...with the exception of Karen Sirko who played piano. Hauntingly beautiful arrangements that I can still remember. And he was eulogized by Rod Reyes, Artie Snyder...and Daisy Jones.

**Daisy:** Yasmine has asked me to speak and I had originally said no. I couldn’t do it. But that day I just...changed my mind. And I was sober. So the combination of those things was pretty terrifying.

**Camila:** We went back and forth on whether to take the girls. They had loved him. God, they had loved him so much. He was this loud commanding giant of a man but he was like a grandfather to them. Always showering them with gifts and treats and...he just doted on them like they were his. And in a way, I knew they were.

**Billy:** Death is a hard thing to understand. I mean I still don’t. I don’t know anyone that does. I think musicians tend to feel like music is what makes us immortal. Our songs and our stories can live forever, man, you know? But you can’t appreciate that unless you realize that it means your flesh and your bones...well, they just don’t. I was glad to have my girls there that day because it was a good reminder to try to wrap your head around life. Not just death. 

**Karen:** Julia sat with me on the piano bench and she leaned on my arm when I played. Any other human touching me while I was trying to play and I would have lost it. But something about her curled up to me and listening to the music so so intently, I just loved it.

**Graham:** I couldn’t take my eyes off of Karen. With Julia like that. We were carrying Teddy in and I was just staring at them thinking...yeah, Teddy would have wanted this. His family. (He pauses.) Oh well, right?

**Karen:** I looked at Yasmine and I know that some people thought about how alone she was. I thought about how free she was. People would ask what she would do next and you know what? She could do anything. Teddy did that for her. She could do...anything.

**Camila:** Billy sat between Yasmine and I, right in the front, we each held one of the girls. Susana was asleep on his shoulder and Maria was eating snacks the whole time but he took my hand and he held it so hard. So tight. He never let it go. I’d squeeze it off and on and he would smile at me, or lean in and kiss me. It was a hard day. But we were such a team. We just...had a rhythm. We always have. When you put a tea bag in hot water...that’s when you know what it’s made of. That was us. We got through the day to day bullshit. The doubt, the worry, the fear. But when things were real? That’s when Billy and I always knew we were a unit. Nothing could get in the way of that. Not the dope. Not the band. And not Daisy. And I watched him that day and I thought...he has to stick this out. And I have to have his back. And that was all there was to it.

**Graham:** When Daisy got up to speak, I’m not gonna lie, it made me queasy. When Daisy opened her mouth it was either gold or complete nonsense. Not a lot of middle ground with her. And I thought as I watched her walk up there...please Daisy:  let this be gold. 

____________________

_** Daisy Jones’ Eulogy For Teddy Price ** _

_I know what everyone is expecting me to say: that Teddy Price was like a father to us. To all of us. Really probably to everyone here. But that’s not what I’m going to say.I could, sure, but that’s too easy. And Teddy was never worried about things being easy. Teddy didn’t ask me to be part of this family because he thought it would be easy. He asked me to be part of this band because he knew it would be magic. That’s what he was, right? A Magician. A mastermind. He saw something in me that was good on my own...but he knew how to make it magic. He looked at the words that Billy wrote and he knew they were good on their own...but he knew how to make them magic. And that’s why we loved him. He forced us to look at ourselves and really dig deep and put the bullshit aside...sorry girls...put the bad stuff aside...to make magic. Karen didn’t walk away the first time Teddy_ _decided to pull her keys back. Eddie didn’t throw a fit every time his riffs got changed. Oh wait...yes he did. Moving on...we all trusted Teddy to push us through being uncomfortable knowing that there was sheer fucking magic on the other side. Fuck. Sorry girls._

_So my point is this. We can’t stop doing what is hard because he isn’t here to push us. We can’t give up on things that are uncomfortable because we will be missing so...much...magic._

_Everyone here is my family. And Teddy gave that to me. And being a family is ugly sometimes. You can tell yourself you’re walking away but you can never really walk away from the things that are already inside you. Once you let them in? They are there forever. Teddy let me in. He let us all in. To this band and this family. He did that for everyone and he never asked anything in return other than we make good music and...._

_We make good music. We do hard things. We make the right choices. I will never make another one without asking myself....what would Teddy Price want me to do? Because I will spend the rest of my life looking for magic. Cause that’s where we will find him. Scattered in the magic. In our music. We lose that? That’s when we lose him. Not today._

________________

**Graham:** If I’m being honest? It was gold AND complete nonsense. And it was perfectly Daisy.

**Camila:** She delivered that eulogy to Billy. And I knew that it meant he had told her he was leaving the band. He wouldn’t look at her but she stared at him the whole time. She cried. For him, not for Teddy. Maybe for Teddy, too. But...I knew she and I were on the same page. If someone was leaving the band...it wasn’t going to be Billy.

**Billy:** That eulogy wasn’t about me. I hadn’t really talked to Daisy about what I was thinking. But I knew she was feeling it, too. That was just how Daisy was. Everything was magic. Things that didn’t make sense were always gonna be the most real to her. 

**Julia/Narrator:** Including you?

**Billy:** (pause) I was never really real to Daisy. Daisy saw in me what she wanted to see. What she needed to see. I guess some people just do that to other people. Try to make them something they aren’t. 

**Camila:** Everyone went for brunch after and I was so glad the girls were there.They were tiny little beautiful buffers. Anytime someone would corner Billy about the music, or the next album, or when the tour was going to start back up...he would effortlessly turn it into needing to take Susana to the bathroom. Or Maria spilling dessert. Or how Julia was learning to play guitar. I knew he was just deflecting. But it also made me mad that people couldn’t just let him mourn. It was right back to the music. The girls saved him from that. For a little while anyway.

**Billy:** The girls were bushed that night. It had been a busy week of people in and out. Not to mention a day full of activity they couldn’t really even understand. So they crashed hard. It was good. It was good for me and Camila to talk about the future. Losing someone will do that to you, you know? Make you take stock of what really matters.

____________________

_Camila and Billy tag teamed putting the girls into beds. Baths, teeth, pajamas, and books...a routine that had come to include a phone call to Billy out on the road...but now included him taking the twins while Camila took Julia. They reconvened in the kitchen, Camila pouring them glasses of water as they swapped stories about who fell asleep first and who fought it the hardest. Billy was washing his hands on the sink when Camila moved behind him and pressed into his back. He turned off the water and leaned on the counter, inhaling at the feel of her pressed into him._

_“Can you really do this, Billy? A lifetime of stories about which one of your daughters spits her toothpaste the furthest?” She was smiling against him, charmed by the details, but holding a deeper question in her gut. He turned to her and took her in his arms as he looked down on her there._

_“Yes.”_

_He didn’t hesitate. He smiled a smile so genuine she knew he really believed it._

_“Good. Cause I can’t.”_

_Billy frowned and furrowed his brow._

_“What do you mean you can’t?”_

_“I mean I can’t. I didn’t marry Fred Rogers, I married Billy Dunne. You can’t sit around this house playing dolls and making dinner. It’s not who you are.” Camila spoke gently but firmly as Billy’s unease grew._

_“I can’t be out there while THEY play dolls and YOU make dinner. I want to be here. I want to see it. I don’t...look I don’t want to knock over in the middle of the night some day having missed all the....toothpaste.”_

_They chuckled lightly together. And Camila heard him._

_“It’s not up for discussion, Camila, I made up my mind....”_

_“That’s where you are wrong. It’s is very much up for discussion. We are a team. This is what we do. We discuss. We make decisions for our family. We do that together.”_

_Billy grit his teeth, knowing that she was right and cursing the fact that he had been so sure she would support his decision.She studied his face._

_“I keep having this dream. A week now I’ve had it. It’s Teddy. He’s talking to me. He’s right here. But I can’t hear his words. Or they don’t make sense, like they aren’t in English.But he’s right there, Camila, God I know it sounds crazy. But I feel like I’m losing my mind. I can see him. Sometimes I don’t even think I’m asleep. And he is right there. Trying to get me to listen. I don’t know what he’s trying to tell me. But that night....Camila.....I.....”_

_“There’s something you don’t want to say to me. And I won’t make you say it. But you can’t just pretend it away. I know you want to. Teddy isn’t here to tell you anymore. He isn’t here to force your hand. But you don’t need him to, baby, you can do that now. You can.” She felt her eyes glass over slightly as she spoke._

_“Camila....” Billy put his hands on her hips as he tried to stop her._

_“We will come with you. The girls and me. We will be there with you. And if it doesn’t work? If you give it a few months and this voice telling you to walk away won’t shut up? We_ _will talk again.”_

_ Billy shook his head and stared at his bare feet on the floor. But he didn’t argue with her. She smiled and lifted his chin. _

_ “It burns you that I’m right all the time. Doesn’t it?” She teased him as she pressed her nose to his and felt him smile. _

_“Something like that....” he lifted his lips until they gently brushed hers...just as a tiny voice called to him from upstairs._

_“Go. Get her settled and then come make love to me....ok?”_

_ Camila ran her hands down his arms before taking his hands. They walked towards the stairs and took them side by side before Billy went into Julia’s room and Camila headed into their own. Billy was with Julia for close to twenty minutes. Enough time for Camila to light candles, throw some jazz on the record player in their room, and slip naked into the cool sheets. Billy hadn’t made it through the door before he had raised his hands to pull his shirt from his back. He tossed it aside as he moved, undoing his jeans and stepping out of them as he dove into the sheets. _

_“It’s fucking freezing.” he mumbled as he pulled the comforter up around them and Camila tucked her body neatly under him._

_“It’s February.” She joked back, kissing the warm skin of his chest as he lowered against her. He let his hand travel her stomach...searching for her...but she caught it._

_“I’m ready...it’s ok....” her voice was already thick with desire for him. They hadn’t made love since he came back from New York and she was craving him.She let her hand find his cock and smiled._

_ “And I’m not the only one....” she whispered softly as she opened her thighs and guided him quickly inside of her. He moaned and whispered her name as she wrapped her legs around his back, pulling the weight he was holding on to her.  _

_He drifted deeply into her and settled there, letting her adjust around him in the way she needed to when it had been as long as it had. He pushed his arms under her in the bed and cradled her against his chest. He tucked his head into her hair and was sure he felt her cry slightly against his skin. They started to move together slowly. Her moaning and breathing encouraging his pace. They were silent, other than their mutual panting and the_ _slick sounds of him pushing and pulling from her. Camila felt herself gradually wetting him and moving slowly closer to releasing around him. Billy sensed it, too, and put his hands on the mattress, lifting just enough to see her sprawled out in a sea of long dark hair underneath him._

_“I love you. You know that? It’s always been you.”_

_Billy panted the words to her and she realized they answered a question she had been thinking but hadn’t actually posed._

_He pressed deep into her and she felt him cumming as he spoke and her body gripped him and milked him as her mouth opened with her own orgasm. She mouthed that she loved him but the sound didn’t come. She held her breath and stared at him...feeling his warmth inside of her. They came together and fell together...his weight falling onto her again as she finally exhaled. They rolled slightly, disconnecting but only just, still wrapped up in both each other and the comforter. Billy was already drifting off to sleep when she pulled his face to hers._

_“I know you’re afraid. I know you’re confused. I know you feel lost. Leaving the band won’t solve that. It’ll make it worse. I trust you. You have to trust me.”_

_Billy nodded and kissed her gently even as he fell asleep, the way making love to her always made him. She watched him drift off to sleep from the comfort of his arms. Trying to ward off the ache in her chest and the recollections of her discussion with Karen. About that night in New York._


	5. Chapter 5

_** February 3, 1979 ** _

_** A week earlier. ** _

_ Billy hung up the phone with Teddy Price before rocking back into the chair he was sitting in. He looked at himself in the mirror for a quick minute before leaning back and staring at the ceiling, tapping out a rhythm he couldn’t place on the arms of the chair. It was soon matched by a rhythmic knocking at the door. _

_ “You gonna come out?” Graham asked as he stuck his head in. Billy sat up and then stood up from the chair, grabbing a heavy coat to throw over his t-shirt. _

_ “Nah...I’m gonna head back to the hotel and try to catch the girls before bed. I’m beat.” _

_ Graham chuckled and shook his head. _

_ “Yeah, man, I figured. You want me to walk you back?” _

_ “Nah, Nah...I’m ok. Hey...is everyone pissed about the change?” _

_ Billy chewed the skin off his thumb as he asked and he and Graham started walking down the hallway towards the stage door together. Graham sighed and then turned to him. _

_ “You mean you axing the band out of a live TV performance, replacing Karen on keys and then proceeding to stage fuck Daisy Jones for every household in America? That change?” _

_ Billy winced. Graham smiled. _

_ “Yeahhhhh....that one.”  _

_ Graham laughed and slapped Billy on the back. _

“ _Nah no one is pissed. It was the right call. Rod said people are going nuts over it. It was tight. Even Karen said your keys were great. Eddie will be pissed but, I mean, Eddie is always pissed.”_

_ Billy laughed and shook his head, reliving it in his mind. It was good. He knew it.  _

_ “Be safe out there, alright?” He nodded to Graham as he pulled his collar up around his ears. _

_ “You sure you don’t want me to come by? Check on you?” _

_ Billy brushed him off. Graham knew these nights were still uneasy: when everyone but Billy would hit an after party. Billy emphatically blew him off. _

_ “Alright man. If you say so. Say hi to Camila. I’ll see you in the morning....” _

___________________________

_** Billy Dunne phone call to Camila Dunne ** _

_** February 3, 1979 ** _

_** 1:00am EST ** _

_**Billy:** Hey, beautiful. _

_**Camila:** Hey. _

_**Billy:** I’m sorry it’s late, I’m guessing I missed the girls. I just wanted to get back to the hotel before I called. _

_**Camila:** Yeah. I tried to keep them up, but even Julia crashed. We can call you in the morning. I’m guessing you need to go... _

_**Billy:** Need to go? No. I called to talk to you. Saying goodnight to them is...well it’s just a bonus. _

_**Camila:** What did you want to talk about? _

_**Billy:** Hey...what’s going on? What do you mean what do I want to talk about? _

_**Camila:** What do you want to talk about? _

_**Billy:** I mean, what we always talk about? Your day...the girls...how you’re doing... _

_**Camila:** How the show was? _

_**Billy:** (pause) Sure. We can talk about that. _

_**Camila:** (long pause) A Hope Like You was different tonight, wasn’t it? _

_**Billy:** (pause) Yeah....we...I thought something acoustic like that would be special. My keys were rusty but... _

_**Camila:** I don’t mean the fucking arrangement, Billy. (Long pause) I mean, IT was different. (Pause) YOU were different. _

_**Billy:** (pause) It’s TV you know? It’s a show...it’s different than a concert....it was more intimate. I mean, the audience was more intimate. _

_ (Long pause) _

_ Say something. _

_**Camila:** It was a show. You put on a good show. I just...I wonder which parts are real anymore.  _

_**Billy:** Camila.... _

_**Camila:** I have to go. I’ll have the girls call in the morning. I love you. _

_ (She hangs up.) _

_**Billy:** I love you, too. I promise. _

______________________

_ Billy hung up, undressed and walked to the shower in one long and languid movement. Desperate to somehow undo some of the things he had done. He just wasn’t sure which ones. He stood in the shower for a long time, never did much more than stand there until he felt the overwhelming weight of his life in general push deep into his shoulders and exhaust him. He shut the water off and pulled a pair of underwear on before all but falling into bed. He had almost convinced himself to succumb to sleep when there was a slight knock at the door. _

_ “Fuck, Graham, I’m not a child...” he muttered, still under the covers. The room quieted for a moment before the knock came again. Louder, longer, and with more urgency. _

_ “For fuck’s sake....” _

_ Billy flung the covers back and stormed to the door. Opening it without checking the peep hole, and realizing he was face to face with Daisy Jones before he even muttered a word. Once it dawned on him, his jaw hung open. She stood there, still in her tank and jeans but wrapped in a fur coat, fiddling with the rings on her fingers. His cheeks flushed slightly as her eyes wandered from his and then down over his mostly exposed form. _

_ “Did you get all dressed up for me?” She teased quietly. Billy ran his hand through his hair and feigned mock embarrassment. _

_ “Sorry. I thought you were Graham.” _

_ She smiled weakly at him. _

_ “I get that a lot. Can....can I come in?” _

_ Billy hesitated and then opened the door wide enough for her to slink past him. He closed it behind her, checking the hallway first, and then making a grab for his jeans which still lay in a pile by the phone beside his bed. _

_ “Is everything ok?” Billy watched as Daisy walked around the room, lazily touching everything she could with shaky fingers. He was still jumping his way into his pants as she turned and spoke to him.  _

_ “I want to get clean.” _

_ The words popped free from her mouth like she had been holding them in for years. And in a way she probably had. She spit them out before she could convince herself not to say them and Billy Dunne did not waste a moment replying. _

_ “Ok.” He said.  _

_ He sat down on the end of the bed, his bare feet flat and solid in direct opposition to her feet that were twisting and turning against each other in sandals that were not at all appropriate for the New York winter. Billy watched them. _

_ “You sure?” He asked after a moment of silence. _

_ Daisy watched him and didn’t answer at first...but instead walked to the bed where he sat and took her place at his side. She watched his feet...still and solid as hers flailed aimlessly. _

_ “Yes.” _

_ She whispered. Billy didn’t lift from the bed but lurched to the phone clumsily. _

_ “Ok let’s make a phone call....” _

_ “Jesus Christ, Billy. I want to get clean. It doesn’t have to be in the next ten minutes.” She reached for him to keep him from making it to the phone, realizing too late that her touch...grabbing the bare flesh of his waist...was more intimate than she should have been. But even as he sat back, she kept her hand on his bare hip. He stared at her and there was a softness in his face he didn’t often share with her. _

_ “Tell me? What it’s like? I mean...rehab...getting clean...all of it...” _

_ Billy leaned back on his palms as Daisy slowly pulled her hand from him. He smiled gently. _

_ “How much time do you have?” _

_ Daisy laughed and tucked her hair behind her hooped ear.  _

_ “All night...” she answered a little too coyly.Billy stood from the bed and helped her pull her coat off. She slid from it and stared at him as he threw it on a couch before making a move to the fridge and grabbing the small bottles of booze into his arms. He walked to the window, opened it, and tossed them out.  _

_ She screamed. A scream that erupted into a giggle. _

_ “That’s insane.” she was still half laughing as she spoke, the room chilling from the still cracked window. _

_ “That’s rock and roll....” he answered, moving back towards her and sitting beside her on the bed. They sat there quietly, both of their eyes on their feet as Daisy slipped her sandals off and her toes brushed his. _

_ “So....why now?” Billy whispered to her, turning to face her even as her eyes stayed downwards...but her fingers made a painfully slow and calculated movement until they rested on top of his, their fingers slowly intertwining on the comforter between them. _

_ “You know why, Billy. I know you know.” Daisy’s voice was still soft but it was growing in intensity as she managed to pull her eyes from their feet...to their fingers...to his eyes. He stared at her. In that way he did on stage where he saw her. Really saw her. His seeing her was her why. And she had meant what she said: he knew he was he was. _

_ Even if they both wished he wasn’t. _

_ “Daisy....” he started in a tone already thick with remorse and longing, “you can’t get clean for someone else. It doesn’t work that way.” _

_ “You got clean for Camila.” _

_ She stopped him and he knew she was right. _

_ “It’s...different. You know it’s different.” _

_ Daisy smiled at the warmth in his voice. It was an apology. _

_ “Ok then. What if I do it for the chance to someday be the kind of person that spends a night in the city that never sleeps coming back to a hotel room to make a phone call more fulfilling than a night full of tequila shots with strangers. How’s that? I’m...bored Billy. I’m bored. With my life. I need to be clean. I need to...see things clearly. I don’t know that I ever have. Really.” _

_ Her admittal was as much a surprise to her as it was to him. But her words made sense to him. Even if they both knew there may not be another person in the world that would understand. _

_ “Are you seeing clearly now?” Billy leaned in almost subconsciously as he spoke and Daisy couldn’t help but mirror him and do the same. She gulped and felt her heart race as he closed the space. Their fingers still linked. She felt him tighten his around her. _

_ “I saw clearly tonight. On that stage. I saw you.” _

_ Billy leaned down just enough that Daisy could push her forehead into his and she did: pressing it into him and watching his eyes close. She sang the words to him that she had sung to him for everyone to see...but now they were just for him. _

_ “My heart wants to badly just to say it/But a hope like could break it.” _

_ “Daisy...” _

_ “You’re afraid. Why?” _

_ Billy inhaled as she spoke to him, desperate to feel the things he would never show her. _

_ “I’m afraid...I’m afraid I’ll never write another album like Aurora...that all of this is just...luck...that I can’t do what everyone expects me to do.....” _

_ “What else?...” Daisy was high off of his honesty and she didn’t want him to ever stop. She was slowly moving towards him on the bed, so much so that he lifted her hand onto his lap because there was no longer room for it between them. _

_ “You just need me to say it?” Billy purred weakly, opening his eyes to look at her fingers pulling at his and tracing his thigh over his jeans. _

_ “Yes.” Daisy chocked slightly in a way that only let half of the word escape. But she did need to hear him say it. _

_ “I’m afraid...God, Daisy...” _

_ “I know...” Daisy encouraged him as she rolled her head until it was resting beside his, gently nuzzling the side of it, “I’m afraid, too....but....” _

_ The hotel room phone rang. It jolted them both. Daisy pulled her fingers from his as he straightened up and cleared his throat...both of them feeling like they were somehow pulled from a dream. The phone continued to ring. Daisy eyed it. _

_ “I need to take it. It could be...” _

_ “I know....answer it....” Daisy looked at him in a way that assured him she would be quiet. Regardless of who it was. _

_ “Yeah...” Billy answered. Daisy watched his back stiffen and then relax as she stilled on the bed across from him...listening to the part of the conversation she could hear. _

_ “Oh....yeah...Listen can you just tell him that it’s not a good time and...really unless it’s an emergency...I’d rather not...look just tell him I’m really tired and I’m not taking calls tonight. Ok? Yeah....thank you.” _

_ Billy hung up the phone.  _

_ “It was Teddy, wasn’t it?” Daisy asked through a smile as she crawled over the bed until she was behind him. He turned to face her over his shoulder. He cocked a half smile. _

_ “It was.” _

_ “I thought I was the only one he called to check in on after shows. Of course...he probably genuinely wants to know how you thought things went. Me? I just think he wants to know I’m still breathing.” Billy turned to her as she spoke and frowned. _

_ “Nah...Teddy respects the hell out of you Daisy.We both do.”  _

_ “Maybe he wanted to see what you were going to write for this next album. I mean the tour is almost over. Maybe we need to start thinking...” _

_ “Maybe we need to start thinking about getting you clean. That's why you're here. Maybe that’s what we can write about....” _

_ Daisy smiled at his interruption as she moved to sit by him, facing the opposite direction on the bed. Her legs draped across it as his dangled from it.  _

_ “That’s rock and roll. Billy Dunne and Daisy Jones singing to each other about kicking the habit and being clean...." She joked. _

_ “You think your life is boring NOW....ok then, Daisy Jones. What would you rather write about?” Billy tried to joke back, even if he knew they were past that. _

_ “The things that get me high...that aren’t drugs. Or booze.” _

_ “Like....” Billy knew the answer. But it was his turn to need to hear it out loud. _

_ “Like....you....” She hung her head back slightly as she spoke, cocking it slightly to lean into him. He was chewing the inside of his lip and all she could think was...I want to chew that lip. She leaned forward, facing him but still beside him. She slowly drew her legs underneath her until she was kneeling by his side. Taller than he was as he sat beside her, and looking down on him and not up for maybe the first time. Billy watched her move silently and then reached a hand towards her, his fingers brushing the skin of her arm and eventually down to her fingers. She took his hand in hers.  _

_ As their fingers looped and laced lazily through and around each other’s, she made small movements towards him until she was slipping a leg across his lap. She gradually let the weight of her body shift and follow it until she was on him, facing him. Her flesh heating under her too-thin tank and slowly making its way against the smattering of hair on his chest. He took her other hand and held it at their waists, rolling her fingers in his as her attempt to scoot closer to him read as a grind against his growing erection. He groaned almost inaudibly. _

_ “Daisy....” he whispered. _

_ The phone rang again. Daisy studied his eyes and watched them decide not to answer it. A decision that masked a deeper one. Daisy reached for the phone and lifted it off the receiver before hanging it up and leaving it off the hook. The pang of guilt that Billy felt disappeared as soon as she turned back and met him with a smile that might have been the most genuine she had ever shown him. One hand still holding his, she let the other loop over his shoulder and find the still wet curls at the nape of his neck.  _

_ “Are you afraid right now?” She asked innocently, her eyes bouncing back and forth from his.  _

_ “No.” She was pleasantly surprised by the lack of thought he had to put into an answer. He pressed his head back into her fingers and closed his eyes under the warmth of her hand. Daisy closed the space between them and gently pulled him to her until her lips brushed his. His eyes opened and met hers for a moment before closing again as he moved his hands around her lower back, caressing her there gently as he deepened their kiss. Daisy turned her head in opposition of his as their lips met and parted, easing on and off of each other. Billy gently started to ease them back onto the bed, Daisy gliding effortlessly down over him even as Billy lifted her silky pink tank up and off of her body. He felt himself bite his lip, pulling his mouth from hers, as he took in the soft pink skin of her nipples...hard in the chilled air, but still as delicate and fragile as the rest of her. Daisy watched as he took her in and slowly lifted a hand under her breast, offering it to him. Billy leaned into her, closing his lips...warm and wet...around her achingly hard nipple. Her hair tumbled down her back as she rolled her head back and moaned, feeling his tongue flick over her nipple quickly. She was absentmindedly rocking against him, his hips easing off and on the bed to press into her as his erection grew in his jeans to the point where he was uncomfortable. He reached between them to free the pressure and met Daisy’s fingers doing the same. So while she opened his jeans...he found hers. And soon they were crumbling together onto the bed, mutually squirming against each other until their jeans were on the floor and Billy’s underwear were the only thing between them.  _

_ Billy took her face in his hands, her hair spilling over them and hanging over his face the way her breasts hung and heaved over his chest. Billy was pressing himself into her so hard that he was all but inside of her, and her body had soaked through the cotton he was wearing. She held his chest and rode him that way, they studied each other deftly. Staring into each other the way they did when they sang...but now, they were silent. The room was silent. The occasional moan or exhale the only thing filling the air between them. _

_ Until it wasn’t. _

**_ “Billy...Billy can you hear me?”  _ **

_ Billy froze under Daisy as he heard it. Watching Daisy, confused by how unphased she was. He shook it off, slowly meeting her again where she was, lifting his upper body to meet hers and pull her deeper into his lap. He had just closed his lips to hers when he heard it again. _

**_ “Billy. You aren’t helping her.” _ **

_ Billy pulled from her quickly, unexpectedly. This time, it jarred her, too. Daisy fought to catch her breath and watched his panic. He studied her face and then stared at the phone. She saw his brow break out in a sweat as his chest rose and fell. _

_ “You...you hung it up?” He whispered to her. She nodded yes. He reached for it...still holding her on his lap. She could see his hand shake before he stilled it, pulling the receiver to his ear and swallowing. _

_ “Teddy...?” _

_ The line was dead. Billy listened for a moment before sitting it back down. But he unplugged it for safe measure. _

_ “Was he....” _

_ “No no...no. I just. I’m hearing things. Nerves I guess...” Billy calmed her and tried to calm himself as well. _

_ “You don’t have to be nervous...but you also don’t have to do this....” _

_ Daisy brushed the hair on his face and tried to read him...he was obviously still unnerved. _

_ “I know...” he whispered before burying himself into her chest, placing small kisses between her breasts as she wrapped her arms around his head. Daisy reached between them and laced a finger into the flap of his underwear, her fingertips finding the hot, slick flesh of his length. He hissed and groaned against her as she moved the fabric to pull him free of it. _

**_ “You can’t help her, Billy. Not like this.” _ **

_ “Fuck!” _

_ Billy pulled himself from her, all but falling on the bed. Daisy yanked her hand from him, sure she had crossed a line she hadn’t seen. _

_ “I’m....I’m sorry....” She apologized meekly, covering her breasts with her arms. _

_ “No...no it’s not that.” He stared at the phone, hanging unplugged, before I raised his hands to his temples. Daisy frowned in confusion but also sympathy.  _

_ “It’s been...a week. Tonight really took it out of you....” _

_ Billy smiled at her even as he rubbed his face.  _

_ “I can go. We can talk in the morning about...you know....what I need. What I need to do.” _

_ “No...” Billy interrupted her apology and goodbye, pulling her closer to him, “...no. I want you to stay. I just..we can't....come here....” _

_ Billy pulled her to him and fell back into the bed. This time he held her by the back as he maneuvered them together until they were under the thick down of the comforter. He laid himself back and pulled Daisy into the crook of his chest. She nuzzled into him. They never said another word...but gradually and effortlessly drifted off to a peaceful sleep. A mutual understanding of things that would remain unsaid. At least for another night. _

_Daisy was still fast asleep, curled neatly against Billy’s side, when he jolted from a deep sleep and rose from the bed. There was a lump in his throat. He couldn’t swallow it away. As he sat there, a cold sweat rising over his body, he felt his arms heavy at his sides in a way that made him unnaturally afraid. He looked back at Daisy, peacefully sleeping in his bed with a subtle smile painted across her lips and eyes. He was staring at her sleeping when he felt a sharp sting in his chest. It knocked the wind out of him and he fought to catch his breath to ease the pain. Billy pulled himself from the warmth of Daisy’s body and slid off the side of the bed. He paced slowly, unable to catch his breath and stumbling towards the bathroom to try to calm himself down.Billy leaned over the sink and splashed water over his face, feeling his heart pound in his chest._

**_ “Go home, Billy.” _ **

_ It was Teddy’s voice. _

_ Billy stood quickly. Too quickly. He blinked hard against the impending light headedness and turned quickly...sure he had seen Daisy come in behind him.  _

_ “I’m losing my fucking mind...” _

_**“Go home, Billy...”** _

_ This time it was Daisy calling to him from the bedroom. Billy rounded the corner and leaned against the door jamb as the pain in his chest started to subside. _

_ Daisy was still fast asleep. Unmoved from the spot he had left her in. Billy walked to the bed where there jeans were tangled together on the floor. He glanced at the clock.  _

_ 3:00am. _

_ Billy stood and watched her sleep. Biting his lip, chewing his nails. An aching in his chest that was becoming less physical but more potent. He knew what he had to do.  _

_ Billy quietly slipped into his jeans and tshirt. He reached for the jacket he had hung over the chair and slowly eased his arms into it. Billy knelt by the bed. He traced her arm with his fingers. Studying the feel of her.  _

_ “I’m sorry Daisy. It...it can’t be me.” _

_ He leaned over her and kissed her forehead. She smiled softly but didn’t wake.  _

_ Billy felt another pang in his chest as his head filled with thoughts he couldn’t get process. Images of Teddy. Words he couldn't hear. He backed from the bed and, leaving everything else he had brought with him but his wallet, left her in his hotel room and walked to the lobby to rent a car. _

_ To go home. _

_ To choose Camila. _

_ To choose his family. _

_ To choose to leave the band...even if deep down in places he couldn't name: he was desperately needing them both to talk him out of it. _


End file.
